This is the war cry one hears unanswered on most college campuses; this is the damning claim of many vociferous non-governmental bodies. Racist Israel, discriminatory Zionists, imperialistic Jews - the mantra of almost all related Mideast and Arab websites, the repetitive agenda of all Jihadist organizations and regimes. Everyone seems to agree.

Yet evidence and proof is never conclusively cited, as though the receptive audience is prepared, pre-programmed, ever willing to imbibe these age-old canards. These are comfortable views for those fixated on 6 million non-Arab Israelis as the oppressors and the 350 million Palestinians and Arabs in the Middle East as the victims.

Were they not already the victims before the state of Israel was established in 1948, before the forced immigration thereafter of 800,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands, before the 1967 war on Israel when the West Bank fell into Israeli hands? The Christian population of Bethlehem, tellingly, has dropped by two thirds under the Palestinian Authority, with most leaving for non-Muslim countries.

I submit the most simple of tests, the most obvious of irrefutable truths: look at how the minorities in each area are treated - then, and only then, can you determine who the victims are and who the oppressors are. This is not to say that all these communities, including Israel, have still much to do for minority rights and their quality of life.

Rather, witness the testimony of the Bahá'ís, Kurds, Christians, Copts, Zoroastrians, Druze and a great many other religious and ethnic minorities, from Afghanistan through to Algeria. Michael Oren, eminent historian, educator and writer, hereafter succinctly covers this all-too-often ignored story:

The Plight of Mideast Christians Michael Oren

The church in Bethlehem had survived more than 1,000 years, through wars and conquests, but its future now seemed in jeopardy. Spray-painted all over its ancient stone walls were the Arabic letters for Hamas. The year was 1994 and the city was about to pass from Israeli to Palestinian control. I was meeting with the church's clergy as an Israeli government adviser on inter-religious affairs. They were despondent but too frightened to file a complaint. The same Hamas thugs who had desecrated their sanctuary were liable to take their lives.

The trauma of those priests is now commonplace among Middle Eastern Christians. Their share of the region's population has plunged from 20% a century ago to less than 5% today and falling. In Egypt, 200,000 Coptic Christians fled their homes last year after beatings and massacres by Muslim extremist mobs. Since 2003, 70 Iraqi churches have been burned and nearly a thousand Christians killed in Baghdad alone, causing more than half of this million-member community to flee. Conversion to Christianity is a capital offense in Iran, where last month Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani was sentenced to death. Saudi Arabia outlaws private Christian prayer.

As 800,000 Jews were once expelled from Arab countries, so are Christians being forced from lands they've inhabited for centuries.

The only place in the Middle East where Christians aren't endangered but flourishing is Israel. Since Israel's founding in 1948, its Christian communities (including Russian and Greek Orthodox, Catholics, Armenians and Protestants) have expanded more than 1,000%.

Christians are prominent in all aspects of Israeli life, serving in the Knesset, the Foreign Ministry and on the Supreme Court. They are exempt from military service, but thousands have volunteered and been sworn in on special New Testaments printed in Hebrew. Israeli Arab Christians are on average more affluent than Israeli Jews and better-educated, even scoring higher on their SATs.

This does not mean that Israeli Christians do not occasionally encounter intolerance. But in contrast to elsewhere in the Middle East where hatred of Christians is ignored or encouraged, Israel remains committed to its Declaration of Independence pledge to "ensure the complete equality of all its citizens irrespective of religion." It guarantees free access to all Christian holy places, which are under the exclusive aegis of Christian clergy. When Muslims tried to erect a mosque near the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth, the Israeli government interceded to preserve the sanctity of the shrine.

Israel abounds with such sites (Capernaum, the Hill of the Beatitudes, the birth place of St. John the Baptist) but the state constitutes only part of the Holy Land. The rest, according to Jewish and Christian tradition, is in Gaza and the West Bank. Christians in those areas suffer the same plight as their co-religionists throughout the region.

Since the Hamas takeover of Gaza in 2007, half the Christian community has fled. Christmas decorations and public displays of crucifixes are forbidden. In a December 2010 broadcast, Hamas officials exhorted Muslims to slaughter their Christian neighbors. Rami Ayad, owner of Gaza's only Christian bookstore, was murdered, his store reduced to ash. This is the same Hamas with which the Palestinian Authority of the West Bank recently signed a unity pact.

Little wonder, then, that the West Bank is also hemorrhaging Christians. Once 15% of the population, they now make up less than 2%. Some have attributed the flight to Israeli policies that allegedly deny Christians economic opportunities, stunt demographic growth, and impede access to the holy sites of Jerusalem. In fact, most West Bank Christians live in cities such as Nablus, Jericho and Ramallah, which are under Palestinian Authority control. All those cities have experienced marked economic growth and sharp population increase-among Muslims.

Israel, in spite of its need to safeguard its borders from terrorists, allows holiday access to Jerusalem's churches to Christians from both the West Bank and Gaza. In Jerusalem, the number of Arabs-among them Christians-has tripled since the city's reunification by Israel in 1967.

There must be another reason, then, for the West Bank's Christian exodus. The answer lies in Bethlehem. Under Israeli auspices, the city's Christian population grew by 57%. But under the Palestinian Authority since 1995, those numbers have plummeted. Palestinian gunmen seized Christian homes-compelling Israel to build a protective barrier between them and Jewish neighborhoods-and then occupied the Church of the Nativity, looting it and using it as a latrine. Today, Christians comprise a mere one-fifth of their holy city's population.

The extinction of the Middle East's Christian communities is an injustice of historic magnitude. Yet Israel provides an example of how this trend can not only be prevented but reversed. With the respect and appreciation that they receive in the Jewish state, the Christians of Muslim countries could not only survive but thrive.

Born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1952. My family and I have lived in Los Angeles since 1991. Active in fundraising and promotion of charitable organizations and causes in particular areas promoting moderate Islam (women’s rights and the reinterpretation of the Koran from a moderate and tolerant perspective) combating terrorism, extremism and radicalism in both North America and the Middle East whilst strengthening the tolerance and individual free expression. Conceived, initiated and funds “Women’s Voices Now”, a human rights organization and film festival for women in the Muslim World.

Academic background includes both psychology and computer science at the Univ. of Witwaterstrand, South Africa. Worked in various capacities in opposition to apartheid and in support of the Black and Jewish South African communities in the early 70s – at that time was Chairman of the South African Union of Jewish Students and was on the Executive of the World Union of Jewish Students as well as publisher of various student art and culture magazines.

International art dealer since the 70s; Publisher of various art books and catalogue raisonnes, curator of international, gallery, and art exhibitions. Has two modern and contemporary master galleries in Los Angeles. Family office of general investments focusing on private equity and hedge funds.